Friday, September 7, 2012

Episode 45 - Caves of Qud

Welcome to Roguelike Radio episode 45. This week we look at the post-apocalyptic roguelike Caves of Qud. Talking this ep are Andrew Doull, Brian Bucklew (unormal), Jason Grinblat (hand of luke), Nick DeCapua (kilmarath) and Jeff Bartel.You can download the mp3 of the podcast, play it in the embedded player below, or you can follow us on iTunes.

Topics discussed in this episode include:
- The influence of Gamma World on the game and game world
- Five years of development history
- An school interface with modern design principles
- Building a roguelike community
- The upcoming commercial roguelike the team have been working on, including the beta signup page
Also mentioned was an article by Quintin Smith about the depth of DOTA2.

I don't know the answer to that, but I suppose that it would depend on how selective you are about the design inspiration. But here's one that is in development that does that: Clockwork Empires. It's by the same people who did Dungeons of Dredmor): http://www.gaslampgames.com/2012/08/27/clockwork-empires-the-press-release/

Haldurson: I am fully aware of (and excited by) Clockwork Empires. However I think it looks like it may end up more akin to the Sim and Theme games. What Caves of Qud copies from Dwarf Fortress is the idea of "complexity for complexity's sake". This is true in both the mechanics and the horribly messy display (sorry Unormal!) The idea of a game who's main feature is just insane complexity seems counter to the idea of a game being accessible. But of course we know full well that this feature of complexity is a major draw to certain games for many players.

I haven't gotten too deep into Caves of Qud, beyond a general enjoyment of it, but I'd say it's highly accessible if you take the time to read what it gives you. It is complex and it is a lot of stuff, but it's all very well documented if you read, which I guess may be difficult to a lot of people

So I'm super-late to the party on this one. Qud is a wonderful game. I'm not sure I think of it as much more complex than Nethack on the basic how-do-I-play level, DF inspiration aside. But I'm also the guy who got to know DF in college, then moreso during a post-college unemployment period, so maybe I'm not the best guy to ask? When I play Qud, though, I mostly just like setting things on fire, and at least to my mind, I think of it as having more depth than necessarily complexity, at least in the sense of basics required to play. Though Qud is perhaps not the best beginner's RL either because it throws things at you like the *spoiler* that is Golgotha or the not-so-spoiler of the wall-vine-trap things, that aren't necessarily what (at least I) expected from an RL.

I would like to suggest one thing though along the lines of visual aesthetics, and I think this is true of both DF and Qud: The prettier you try to make a 16-color ascii RL, the more confusing the graphics will get, at least for those uninitiated. Especially re: things like grass having different tiles, different types of trees or walls or vines being present, etc. In that sense it certainly is more like DF than a simpler dungeon-crawler like Nethack, which tends to use much more straightforward and universal indicators for walls, floors etc.